April, 2013

Once a contender for jazz band of the year, the GTS Jazz Trio discovers it’s time for new directions

In their heyday, the GTS jazz trio was widely considered among the best jazz bands in Cambodia, with regular dates at the Riverhouse and the Sofitel. They were the subject of glowing articles in The Advisor and other publications.

As good as they were, however – and they were good – Phnom Penh’s smallish music scene proved tough terrain for a jazz band to flourish.

“It’s very difficult to have a pure jazz quartet here,” says Sebastien Adnot, who along with Gabi Faja and Toma Willen have disbanded GTS in order to pursue a new four-man project fronted by Australian sax-man Euan Gray.

The new group is named Kin. After a year of promoting “the GTS Jazz Trio and Euan Gray,” Adnot says the four “were looking for something short.”

The quartet will make its debut at The FCC on April 20.

“Before we were just a trio,” says Adnot, a native of France who moved to Cambodia two years ago, of the change. “We played only jazz standards. And sometimes when we needed a singer or a sax player we invited someone. We functioned as a rhythm section for a soloist.”

Gray was among the frontmen with whom the trio regularly partnered. After a year of regular gigging, cementing the relationship seemed like the next logical step.

The spirit of jazz will remain, Adnot says, no doubt serving as group’s musical foundation. But Kin will experiment with different sounds. “Jazz,” he says, “even if you are a fantastic player, is not always easy listening for everyone. You have to be used to listening to jazz a little bit.”

The new group will makes forays into pop and soul. “Funky stuff,” Adnot says, like Stevie Wonder.

“We are all from very different backgrounds,” says the lone Italian Faja, “Classical, Gypsy, Jazz, Raggae. In fact our music is a hybrid of all.”

The commitment to a new name is reflected in the group’s ambitions. Original music scores are in the pipeline, professional photo and video shoots are in the works, nd the four are working with a professional graphic designer to polish the quartet’s branding.

“Having a new band is like having a baptism,” Adnot says. “It’s a rebirth.”

After becoming a hit with audiences in Siem Reap, the Siem Reapers are making their Phnom Penh debut at the FCC on Apr. 6.

The band that plays jazz rock with pop and funk influences “unofficially” got its start in October 2012 when band members got together and started playing gigs at various venues in Siem Reap, says band member Alexandre Scarpati. But it wasn’t until last December that the band took on a name.

Prior to the formation of the Siem Reapers, the members had played various types of music around Siem Reap, including ska and even old Khmer music before they gradually came together to perform in their current incarnation.

“In the beginning, the band was a quartet who grew up and now has also a trombone player. And we often invited some different singers from the Siem Reap music scene to join us,” he explains.

The Siem Reapers’ current lineup consists of Scarpati on Trombone, Константин Кожемякин (Kostya) on lead vocals, Patrick Charbonney on saxophone, Evgeny Shcherbakov on drums, and Nikki Vladimirovich on guitar. The band members come from Russia, France and the Netherlands, Scarpati says, adding that the band members bring a wide range of musical influences to the band including classical, rock, jazz, and pop.

While many ex-pat singers and musicians in Cambodia hold regular day jobs that are not related to their lives as performers, the Siem Reapers are all professional musicians. While the Apr. 6 gig at the FCC marks the first time the band is playing in Phnom Penh, he notes that the members of the band have played with other musicians in Phnom Penh, Sihanoukville, Kampot and Battambang.

Both Westerners and Cambodians have been quite receptive to the Siem Reapers’ performances, Scarpati says. The audiences who come out to see the band varies from gig to gig. “It depends where the band plays. Some places attract only tourists while some places attract only expatriates or Khmer people,” he explains.

Like many ex-pats living in Cambodia, the native of France originally came to the Kingdom on vacation.

“I came to Cambodia for a holiday, and this country seduced me. The smile and the nice heart of the Khmer people made me feel well,” Scarpati says. “So I decided to stop all my projects in France and to do here what I was already doing in France: teaching and playing music. And I don´t regret my decision for one second.”